After years of adverse publicity it received due to insurgency, Jammu and Kashmir is now being projected as a safe destination for tourists.

State tourism secretary Najamus Saqib, told rediff.com that though the state was struggling to get out of the "rough patch", tourist inflow has improved considerably in the last couple of months and hoped that it would pick up further in due course.

"Let me assure the potential tourists that Jammu and Kashmir is as safe or unsafe as New York or any other place. We have had a good inflow of tourists in the last couple of months. Last year we had just 30,000 tourists visiting the valley. But in April and May on an average 35,000 tourists have visited the top tourist spots in the state. I hope it will pick up further," he said.

He said the advisories issued by the United States and some other European countries are keeping the foreign tourists away from Jammu and Kashmir.

"We hardly get foreign tourists in the state. Of late some foreign tourists have started coming to the valley. But the numbers are insignificant. We would like them to come in thousands.

"We have gone to places all over the country to drive home the point that Kashmir is a safe tourist destination. We have even taken tour operators to various important spots. We would now be hosting a meeting of the core group on tourism set up by the prime minister on June 7, which would be attended by the top executives from all the airlines operating in the domestic sector," he said.

He hoped that at the end of the meeting these airlines would announce concessions on airfares to Srinagar, Leh and Jammu, which would bring in more tourists to the state.

"We have taken up the matter with the civil aviation ministry. We have also asked the railway ministry to attach special coaches to trains coming to Jammu for those tourists from the southern part of the country. We hope to get a positive response from both the ministries," he added.

He said that the golf tournament that was held recently by the state government was a great success as ten ambassadors and 35 top executives from the corporate sector had participated in the tournament.